


Her Safety

by fleshblush



Series: This War of Ours [1]
Category: This War of Mine (Video Game)
Genre: Child violence, Gen, Violence, War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-31
Updated: 2018-05-27
Packaged: 2019-05-14 12:25:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14769573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fleshblush/pseuds/fleshblush
Summary: Marko is a fireman who stayed behind in the devastating city of Pogoren during the modern war to help others as much as he can. Thus he is given the duty of protecting a ten year old little girl, Kalina, while her brother tries to get to their uncle in the outskirts of the city. This is their story.





	Her Safety

**DAY 4**

He didn't know just what he had gotten himself into. For the past three years, Marko had been on his own. Helping the unfortunate in the city as much as he could. It was just in the man's nature to use his strength for the better. As a former firefighter, Marko just couldn't help it. Whenever someone knocked on his shelter door, he was always at the ready to help. When he heard that knock on that day Marko was just was ready to lift rubble or secure a house from raiders. He wasn't expecting to open the door and find a young man and a little girl, hiding behind his back with shy brown eyes.

His name was Grozdan and the girl was his younger sister, Kalina. They had been surviving in the war by hiding in their old home, and after their parents didn't return home after a few days, he has decided he is going to go out to the country to try and find their uncle. The country side was safer than the city, everyone knew that. Marko knew it better than anyone. Yet what was Grozdan's reason for coming here? What help did he need from the infamous man in the single standing house on Kraztic street? Marko would've never have guessed.

"Can you look after Kalina for a couple of days? She's a good girl, she won't cause trouble. You look kind hearted, will you please help us?"

How could he say no? She was only a child. There was no way he could just turn her away. And besides, if his daughters had needed a place to stay he would do the same. No, maybe not exactly. However Marko agreed. He couldn't deny her. Marko slowly nodded his head, as if still debating the situation, and said, "Yes. She is welcomed to stay."

The young man seemed to be on the verge of tears at Marko's words. He thanked him over and over again, each 'thank' drilling into Marko's head. He knew this was what he was made to do; to protect people. It didn't matter if it were to be adults or children. Marko had to help people. As Grozdan turned to give his little sister one last hug for quite a while, Marko knew he had made the right choice. This little girl had no business in the war yet here she was and Marko was not going to let her just... die. He didn't even like thinking of the word.

She was rather small, Kalina was. Her older brother engulfed her in his arms as she sobbed silently into his shoulder, her white gloves clinging onto his shirt for everything she was worth. Marko stood awkwardly by, ready to hurry in and close the door to prepare for the night ahead. But he would let them have their moment, for who knew if they would survive. Grozdan muttered reassured words in her ear and he coaxed her to let go, much to her dismay. Once she had let go, Grozdan thanked Marko once more before turning on his heel and sneaking off into the day. Marko stepped inside and turned back to see if she was following, and he wasn't surprised to see that she was not. The young girl stood just outside the door, her small shoulders softly popping up and down as she cried. He felt horrible for breaking them apart but there was nothing more that he could do. He gently spoke to her, "Can you please come inside, Kalina?"

His words shocked her; his accent sounded different than the ones she had heard. Kalina turned back to look at the older man with tears blurring her eyes but she nodded and stiffly entered the shelter's walls. Marko quickly closed the door and locked it, although the lock could do hardly anything with people nowadays. He looked over at Kalina, who just stood there in her tears. He cleared his throat. He needed to get back to work. "There is a room downstairs with a bed. I will be there if you need anything." She didn't give any indications that she understood but he assumed she did. "I am Marko. I promise to take care of you for now." Again, the small girl didn't do anything but walk toward the ladder, each step as soft as a cloud. Marko came to the conclusion that she was very gentle and sensitive. He didn't know exactly how he felt about that but it could hardly harm anything. Before disappearing down the ladder to the basement below, Marko swore he heard a soft 'thank you' come from the girl's mouth.

And off to work he went, trying to fix an old radio he had found in an abandoned house. To be honest, he couldn't just call it abandoned. It appeared as though a shell had ripped through the building, leaving a fire in it's wake. Empty rooms of once a family haunted his being as he ventured inside. He had found ribbons near a wall of spattered blood and couldn't stand to be near the place any longer. After getting the broken radio, a few bottles of clean water, two cans of meat and electrical parts such as wires and switches, Marko traveled back to his shelter. And now he stood at the makeshift workbench he had made, grilling himself over not getting the right parts for the damned radio. He needed just one single wire, he concluded. And he only knew from his days of fixing the old radio at the fire station he had once worked at. The thing was older than anyone in that entire building and it constantly broke, but no one ever thought of getting a new one. No one ever wanted to, Marko thought. It was just something that never changed and gave people comfort. No matter what happened, that radio would always be there. It was extremely bittersweet for Marko now.

After giving up on the radio, he looked over his supplies. He had found a crowbar inside of the house he was in now, stuck under some rubble in the basement. It had come in handy when raiding the place. Marko needed a shovel, he decided. A shovel would help him get into the back room of the basement, and at the construction site a little ways into the city. He remembered when the construction to those apartments had just begun. 'These apartments will be built no matter what,' they had promised. Marko knew of a few gunmen living on the rooftops of that construction site. He found plently of materials and wooden planks there, but wanted to know if there was more to be discovered. And so Marko crafted a shovel. It wasn't the best in the world but it would do the job and that was all Marko needed.

He felt her curious eyes as soon as he started working on his shovel. The door creaked and gave her away, but she didn't come out at first. She watched him for a while, and when he was going to turn to ask her what was wrong, Kalina opened the door and slowly walked up to him. Her eyes were red and puffy and she kept sniffling through her nose. "Do you have... any water?"

Marko nodded. "Upstairs in the refridgerator. You can take one bottle."

The girl nodded and hurried up the ladder. When the shovel was complete Kalina had come back down, and into the room she went.

As the sun was setting, Marko knocked on the door with his one knuckle. He had pulled his hood up and over his head and his pack was already on his shoulders. Kalina slowly opened the door to greet him. Her eyes traveled up to meet his. He didn't want to do this but he needed to. There was no other choice. "I am going out to look for supplies."

Her eyes were immediately wide. Her heart started to pound as he went on, "The shelter is safe but not completely, so you should stay inside the room until I am back. I will try to be back before morning-"

"You're leaving?" Kalina said, her first offical words to the man, and they were filled to the brim with fear. "I... you... no, you can't leave me here alone."

The fear laced within her made Marko regret his decision but he knew it had to be done. "I am sorry Kalina but if I do not go out and find supplies we cannot survive." With that, he dropped onto one knee to meet her height, and his next words were as gentle as could be, "I promise I will come back."

Kalina quickly shook her head, and her tears came soon after. "No, no please. _Please_ don't leave me alone. I don't want the bad people to come for me!"

"Kalina no one will come for you. You are safe here, trust me." Marko's eyes searched the girl for anything to say, anything to cease her tears but found nothing. "I have to go now. Stay inside the room." He stood up, nodded swiftly and closed the door. Up the ladder and out the shelter he went, ready to scavenge to survive.

  
**DAY 5**

It was near four in the morning when he came back to the shelter. Through the broken glass window, he unlocked the door and walked inside, tired from the excessive walking he did to the port and back. It was a long ways from here but worth it. Marko found what he needed to fix the radio and even more, he found hunks of fresh deer meat and even some gears and more materials. The night was a success, and from the looks and sounds of things, no one had come in the night. Marko locked the door behind him and climbed down the ladder. He set his bag on the workbench as he walked by and up to the door. Marko turned the knob and slowly opened the door, careful not to wake Kalina up if she were asleep. However, upon opening the door he looked over to see that the bed was empty.

Shock ran throughout his body along with the fear that settled after. He indeed feared the worst. Only after a day of taking care of her, he had lost her. Or had gotten her killed. Marko ran over to the bed. He didn't see any sign of a struggled but who knew what had happened. The man spun around, eyes searching every inch of the room until he remembered the closet in the corner. Without another beat, Marko dashed over to the brown wooden closet and yanked the double doors open to see the curled up body of Kalina, fast asleep. She reminded him of a kitten, bringing her body closer for hear. With a sigh the scare was soon over and Marko gently lifted Kalina up in his arms. He took her over to the bed and settled her onto it, bringing the sheet up to cover her for now.

Exhausted as he was, Marko couldn't just go to sleep without having done anything. He walked out to the workbench and opened his bag, pulling out supplies needed for what he was to build. He had just enough rope and one plank would be just enough for her. After nailing the rope into the plank, Marko took that and the meat upstairs. He put the meat into the refrigerator and tied the crafted swing from the floor above. And afterwards retreating down to the basement room and falling asleep in a pile on the floor next to Kalina and the bed.

 

* * *

 

It was the aroma of food that flew open his eyelids. Drooping, heavy eyelids that wanted nothing more than to stay hidden, forever, and forget about the war and hunger and violence. Yet it was that spark, that tiny flicker of life that made Marko slowly sit upwards on the cold basement floor. He turned his head to the side to see how Kalina was doing in her slumber but the girl was done. The sheets a mess on the bed and the lump where her body should’ve been, disappeared. This kicked Marko back into the world he was living in. He was surviving, taking care of a child as bombs flew around them. Marko jumped to his feet, her name already on his lips as he bursted out of the back room and looked toward the ladder, seeing the afternoon glow shining down. “Kalina!” He yelled, dashing toward the ladder and scrambling up the wooden planks. “Kalina!” He shouted again as he threw the kitchen door open and there she was, standing on a chair with a ladle clutched in her hands. Her soft brown eyes were wide with shock at the sight of him.

He sighed as she said, “Marko you scared me.” The man chuckled a bit.

“You scared me,” he replied, finally looking about the kitchen to see where the source of the smell had come from. On the stove sat a big pot filled to the brim with water, small hunks of meat and vegetables. The smell could make his mouth water. It was soup. “What are you doing?”

The girl turned briefly to her pot, as if making sure it was still there, and said, “My mama taught me how to make soup when my papa was sick. I thought it would be nice to have something to eat when you wake up.”

He walked closer and peered inside of the pot, the scent of the meal rising straight into his nostrils. He wanted to eat it right then and there. It had been so long since he had a proper meal, and although this wasn’t ideal, it was better than what he had been eating. “What did you use?”

“One bunch of vegetables and I cut one huge chunk of meat into five pieces. I only used two water bottles,” Kalina proudly stirred the soup with her spoon, then continued, “Oh! And I used one piece of wood. It was really hard to get it started but I used a match and it finally caught a fire.”

“Next time wake me so I can help you,” Marko said, walking over to the cabinets to fetch two bowls. One was a plastic blue one, with a deep curve, and the other was a white glass bowl. He figured these would do. “Or I can show you how to start a fire.” He offered one bowl to her, which she gladly filled up, and the other. There was only one spoon, the ladle she was using, so Marko would just drink his soup.

The two sat in the kitchen as the fire in the stove warmed them from the chilliness. Kalina sat in the chair and Marko sat against the wall on the floor. Both ate their food silently, not in awkwardness but just in the joy that food was entering their stomachs. Kalina was done first. She licked the juices off of the ladle aftter. The soup wasn’t the best in the world, Kalina knew that, but she was happy she managed to make food for the two of them for one night. After Marko had finished, Kalina took their bowls and put them in the sink. No water ran through the pipes but she liked to think that they would, one day.

She sat back down in her chair, her feet not even touching the ground, as she said, “Thank you for the swing. It reminds me of the park my mama used to take me to before the bad people came and messed everything up.”

It was then Marko realized how young the girl truly was. It made him both sad and angry to see her here, with him, in an abandoned home trying to survive through a war that didn’t concern her. “You are welcome Kalina.”

They were quiet for a minute or two. Kalina looked around the room and took note of all of the cracks and fallen plaster, the dirtiness of the walls and floors near the walls. Marko looked at her, a memory of his own daughters flushing back to him. They didn’t look exactly like Kalina - they had his dark gray eyes and their mother’s beautiful auburn hair - but her small size reminded him of them greatly. He couldn’t imagine his girls here, with him, in the most dangerous place on earth. He would go mad but that’s why they fled to country, went to go live with his mother with his wife. His thoughts drifted to his darling wife when Kalina asked, “Where is your family?”

He tried his best to smile at her. “My wife and daughters are living in the country with my mother.” The memory of their goodbyes roared back, the pain still heavy in his heart. It was for the best, he told himself over and over again. It was for the best. They didn’t want to go and frankly, he didn’t want to either. However, the war was coming. The military had already come in and the radios said things were only going to get worse. Go to the countryside, he told his wife, my mother will take you in. He kissed his wife and his girls and hugged them for what seemed like forever. His daughters begged him to go with them, but he told them he couldn’t. He had to stay and help protect the people who could no protect themselves.

“My mama and papa are in heaven,” the girl said with a sad smile on her face. She didn’t look at Marko, but instead her hands. Her gloves were off, shoved inside of her pocket. “My brother said they are protecting us from heaven. I hope he’s right.”

Marko stared at her again, baffled and shocked at what this small child has gone through, in only three years of the war. She had lost her parents, her home, her entire life. It wasn’t fair, she shouldn’t be here. Yet alas, she was, and Marko made a promise to save her.

 


End file.
